Steve,
I'm a little confused about how to adjust my monitor controls on my Dell U3011 before/during calibration. At the moment, just trying to wrap my head around this, I'm using the xrite i1Profiler because I already own it and am somewhat familiar with it, along with the i1Pro spectrophotometer. In it, I can choose a Rec BT709 'workflow', and it sets defaults for me like D65 and 80 cd/m3 and gamma of 2.2, but I also have options for Native, xy, and Measure (along with the standard D50, D55, etc.) for White Point. The contrast ratio can be set to one of the following: Native, iCC PCS Black Point (287:1), Custom Black Point, Measured Black Point, or Custom which allows me to set a value between 10 and 1000, but I don't know what I should use as a target. The White point is specified as x=0.313 and y=0.329. I also have the option of Matrix based or Table based profiles produced, several Chromatic Adaptation methods, and ICC Ver 2 and 4.
I can tell it to let me manually adjust Contrast, Brightness, and RGB Controls. On my monitor OSD menu, I have a control for Brightness and Contrast, but not sure what I should set these too to begin with. Also, along with a bunch of presets like AdobeRGB, sRGB, Movie, Standard, etc., I have Custom Color, which then allows me to adjust any and all of the following:
Gain for R, G, B Offset for R, G, B Hue for R, G, B, C, M, Y Saturation for R, G, B, C, M, Y
While profiling, only Gain and Offset in the Custom Color settings change anything. Changing Hue and/or Saturation seem to have zero affect (while profiling in i1Profiler - it does affect things outside of this app). Likewise, I can adjust Brightness when it asks me to match my target of 80 cd/m3, but it never asks me to adjust Contrast (which was set randomly to a previous profile). In the past, I've read that you turn Contrast all the way up before profiling, but that really washes things out, even when I turn down the Brightness, so I'm at a loss as to how to configure these monitor settings at the start of profiling.
I'm able to adjust the Gain and Offset on the monitor to get nearly exactly the x,y and K of the target, with Gains at 98-100 for R, G, B, and Offsets between 30 and 50 for R, G, B (range 0 - 100). I don't know how the Gain/Offset interact with the Brightness/Contrast controls, since it seems to be over-specified in that regard.
I can also create a profile for each of my two monitors separately, and they are each loaded into my Quadro 4000 correctly for each monitor, so I know it has dual LUT capability, since I can change them independently. Surprisingly, 80 cd/m3 still seems really bright to me (seated in a darkend room), and definitely brighter than I had it before I calibrated. I've also noticed something (perhaps metamerism?) caused by (I suppose) the LCD backlight when viewing different parts of the screen that seems to reduce contrast.
These monitor controls questions/issues will be evident for me with any CMS I use, so I'm just trying to get a handle on them first. Any insight/suggestions on settings would be GREATLY appreciated.
Thanks, Shane |